urged him to perform the ceremonies usual among Hindus for the repose of the souls of ancestors.
The Name alone, is my lamp, suffering the oil I put therein.
The lamp's light hath dried it up, and I have escaped meeting Death.
O ye people, make me not an object of derision.
The application of a particle of fire will destroy even hundreds of thousands of logs heaped together.[1]
God is my barley rolls[2] and leafy platters,[3] the Creator's name the true obsequies.[4]
In this world and the next, in the past and the future, that is my support.
Thy praises are as the Ganges and Banaras to me; my soul laveth therein.
If day and night I love Thee, then shall my ablution be true.
Some rolls are offered to the gods, some to the manes[5]; but it is the Brahman who kneadeth and eateth them.
Nanak, the rolls which are the gift of God are never exhausted.[6]
The Guru and Mardana in the course of their travels found themselves at a grain-dealer's house. A son had just been born to one of the partners, and several people had come to offer him congratulations. Some threw red powder[7] in token of joy, and voices of blessing and congratulation filled the neighbourhood. Mardana sat down and gazed on the
- ↑ That is, God's name will remove hundreds of thousands of sins.
- ↑ Pind; this word also means the body which is supposed to be put together by the offering of these rolls.
- ↑ Pattal, literally, plates of leaves generally of the palās (Butea frondosa) in which food is placed.
- ↑ Kiriyā, the ceremonies performed on the thirteenth day after death.
- ↑ Chhamchari, those who walked the earth, the manes of ancestors.
- ↑ Āsa.
- ↑ Red powder is thrown on passers-by in India on occasions of festivity. The practice is particularly resorted to on the occasion of the Holi, a Hindu saturnalia.
